Farmers Branch, Where the Lawsuits are Piling Up

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You just knew this was coming: Today, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund (the folks who brought you that lawsuit against Preston Hollow Elementary School) filed a lawsuit today challenging Framers Branch's new law outlawing landlords renting to illegal immigrants. They claim the ordinance, passed in November, violates federal law and "forces landlords to act as immigration officers," reports the Associated Press this afternoon.

This suit comes three days after one filed by three apartment complexes in Farmers Branch, who claim the ban on renting to illegal immigrants is unconstitutional. That law is scheduled to go into effect January 12 -- the same day Farmers Branch is scheduled to make English the city's official language. That part of the ordinance also gets a mention in a different AP story from today: There's a Houston suburb, Friendswood, that isn't acting so friendly as it too tries to get an English-only ordinance in place. The League of United Latin American Citizens is trying to get the city of 33,000 to take the initiative off the May ballot. --Robert Wilonsky